Excellence in teaching and learning: A review of the literature for the Higher Education Academy

The Higher Education Academy commissioned a review of the literature on excellence in learning and teaching in higher education to enhance the higher education sector’s understanding of the varied conceptualisations and usages of the term ‘excellence’ and consider the implications for future policy and practice in relation to promoting and developing excellence. The literature searched included published research in the form of journal articles; books; reports from UK policy bodies and other agencies; as well as ‘grey’ literature. It covered conceptual studies, academic critiques and research studies on learning and teaching, as well as policy documents. Within a diverse and expanding system of higher education, such as in the UK, discourse on teaching and student learning highlights the tensions between different notions of excellence – for example, excellence as a positional good for students, as an aspirational target for continuous quality enhancement, as a form of reputational advantage for higher education institutions or as a means for achieving governmental economic and social goals. The review addressed questions of conceptualisations and usage at different (but interlinked) levels: system-wide; institutional; departmental; individual, and from two different perspectives, teaching and student learning

Integrating research and teaching in higher education: Conceptual issues

Integrating new knowledge created through research with teaching has become an important area that needs prompt attention with the growing emphasis on student learning activities, quality assurance procedures and research funding mechanisms within the UK higher education system. The link between research and teaching is not automatic. Thus, it needs to be created in higher education departments in order to achieve a productive relationship and manage research activities of university staff with teaching duties. The research study, on which this paper is based on, aims to develop principles in relation to transferring research knowledge into teaching through a literature review and case studies. The paper reports conceptual issues related to such a transfer process based on the literature findings

A Framework for Secondary School Education Portal

The purpose of this research is to utilize Information Technology (IT) facilities and infrastructure to facilitate the teaching and learning system in Malaysia. This research aims to introduce an education portal framework as an online learning platform for secondary schools in Malaysia. The methodology applied in this research is Action Research method that includes data gathering process using case study and Expert Review technique. The framework develop from this research was established based on the identification of the key features and functions of an education portal system as put forward by previous researches and added features and functions as recommended by IT and education experts. The framework was transformed into prototype system and tested among selected respondents to assess the perceptions of pupils and teachers on the prototype being developed. The study found that education portal framework is crucial to the Malaysian teaching and learning system in order to implement an online learning environment in schools. Pupils and teachers also agreed that the education portal is important to assist the teaching and learning system. Furthermore, in line with the reigning wired teaching and learning environment in the Malaysian education system, the education portal framework is crucial in achieving the goal of online education in Malaysia. Thus, it is hoped that the framework established from this research can be used as a guide in planning and developing education portal solution

Designing the interface between research, learning and teaching.

Abstract: This paper’s central argument is that teaching and research need to be reshaped so that they connect in a productive way. This will require actions at a whole range of levels, from the individual teacher to the national system and include the international communities of design scholars. To do this, we need to start at the level of the individual teacher and course team. This paper cites some examples of strategies that focus on what students do as learners and how teachers teach and design courses to enhance research-led teaching. The paper commences with an examination of the departmental context of (art and) design education. This is followed by an exploration of what is understood by research-led teaching and a further discussion of the dimensions of research-led teaching. It questions whether these dimensions are evident, and if so to what degree in design departments, programmes and courses. The discussion examines the features of research-led departments and asks if a department is not research-led in its approach to teaching, why it should consider changing strategies

MiRTLE (Mixed-Reality Teaching and Learning Environment): from prototype to production and implementation

This position paper focuses on our efforts to implement and evaluate a Mixed Reality Teaching and Learning Environment (MiRTLE) in higher education institutions and other organisations, our current technical research to streamline and improve the utility of the system, and potential pedagogical developments for MiRTLE in the future

Faculty Rewards and Education Portfolios: A Report on Faculty Perceptions

Many schools in the developed world have adopted portfolios in an attempt to address the scholarship of teaching. This is because of the atmosphere of “publish or perish” which pervades academia. Buying off teaching obligations with research dollars is an increasingly pervasive practice in many institutions and Faculty caught up in this system have generally gone along with it, focusing on the scholarship of discovery at the expense of the scholarship of integration, application, and teaching - little of which carries the financial consequence or peer recognition of sponsored research.1 Add to this the fact that many medical schools world wide have adopted teacher- intensive, integrated hybrid PBL curricula and the result is frustrated teachers who undergo occupational burnout. An ideal faculty reward system should support the priorities and mission of the institution e.g. if improving the quality of teaching and learning is a high priority, then the tenure, promotion, and merit pay system must support quality efforts to redesign the curriculum, improve courses, and increase the effectiveness of teaching.2 Education Portfolios are not widely used in this part of the world, and few Faculty have even heard of the term “Education Scholarship”. This study is a preliminary report on perception of the faculty rewards in place in their institution and their familiarity with the concept of education scholarship. A questionnaire was posted to Faculty of medical schools in Malaysia and also distributed to staff of the National University of Singapore, during an international conference. A total of 54 responses were collected from six institutions (14 were unidentified); representing a response rate of about twenty per cent. Thirty two were teaching in a hybrid curriculum; and 26 were clinical teachers. Thirty three had been in their respective institutions for more than three years.Faculty Rewards; Education Portfolios; medical schools

The conception and role of interdisciplinarity in the Spanish education system

This article provides an overview of the role that interdisciplinarity plays in the Spanish education system. With this aim, we first describe the main conception of the term interdisciplinarity in texts written in Spanish, including other terms that have similar meaning. Then we review the role of interdisciplinarity in the Spanish curriculum at different levels of education, focusing fundamentally on compulsory education. This serves as the basis from which later to analyze Spanish research on interdisciplinarity. Finally, through results of this research and some examples of interdisciplinary school practices, we extract conclusions about the role of interdisciplinarity in teaching practices in the classroom

Is teaching systemically frail in universities and if so what can we do about it?

This article explores the idea of ‘pedagogic frailty’ in relation to teaching systems in higher education. Using a model developed by Kinchin (2015) it explores four interconnected concepts: regulative discourse around teaching; pedagogy and discipline connections; research and teaching links; and locus of control of teaching. The concepts are looked at in terms of how and why they might contribute to pedagogic frailty and alternatively how they could contribute to creating a pedagogic system that is not frail. The article suggests that currently teaching systems are frail in relation to preparing students and staff for the future and that more effective pedagogy could be developed by changes in the structure and content of each of the four dimensions,Final Published versio